


in another life

by impulserun



Series: age of miracles [3]
Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/F, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-15
Updated: 2014-07-15
Packaged: 2018-02-08 23:55:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,213
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1961028
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/impulserun/pseuds/impulserun
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Alternate Avengers AU nobody asked for.</p><p>Or, in which Cosette is Captain America and Eponine is the Winter Soldier.</p>
            </blockquote>





	in another life

This is the other life, the one where Fantine – and by extension her daughter – is born halfway across the world almost a full century too early. The one where Fantine’s husband actually loves her, the one where she becomes a nurse and dies of tuberculosis years after he goes off to fight in the war. This is the one where Cosette is walked to the orphanage by the nice (if a little scary) police officer who bends down and hugs her for the first time before ushering her through the doors to the care of the Sisters. This is the one where almost everybody calls her Euphrasie.

This is the one where Eponine and her siblings are taken from her parents. Gavroche, still a baby, is taken to a separate building; she forgets about him all too easily. Azelma is adopted, because she is younger, less brash, and less headstrong. She misses her; she is alone. Then the Sisters introduce her to Euphrasie, a lost little slip of a thing, big blue eyes too big for her face. She reminds her of Azelma, at first. Another little sister for her to take care of. Until one of them is adopted, anyway.

Neither of them are, and they grow up on the streets of Brooklyn, learning to call each other ‘Cosette’ and ‘Ponine’. This is the life where they move into an apartment together, and find jobs to pay for rent, and Ponine plays the part of an elder sister and tries to find them good husbands, she really does, but there’s not much you can do when most men in the area are sexist, misogynist pigs who want them to stay in the kitchen.

“Bloody hell,” she swears one night, after yet another failed date with a shite called Theodore and his cousin from the army, falling back on their shared sofa. “If I were a man, C’sette, I’d spare us both the trouble and marry you myself.”

“Would you really, Ponine?” Cosette asks with a soft voice and bright eyes. Eponine does not meet her blue eyes with her own pair of grey, does not think of the way her heart flutters in its cage. It’s not right, the feelings she has for her room-mate. That’s what she tells herself. Or tries to.

“Of course I would,” she answers brusquely. “But I ain’t a man, and neither are you, so we have to put up with the fuckin’ pigs that litter the streets, like any other girl.”

Eponine tries not to think of how Cosette’s gaze lingers on her for longer than necessary. 

This is the one with the war.

This is the one where Eponine signs on with the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps. Cosette tries to follow her, but her poor health – her weak lungs, her allergies, almost all of the childhood illnesses that she fought through in the orphanage with Eponine fretting by her side – only nets her 4F after 4F. 

This is the one where Eponine leaves Cosette behind.

This is the one where Cosette meets Dr. Lamarque at the Courfeyrac Expo, after her sixth try at enlisting with the Auxiliary Corps.

This is the one where Cosette promises Eponine to stay put in Brooklyn. This is the one where Cosette lies.

This is the one where Cosette is the only girl undergoing Basic with the SSR. The one where her commanding officer looks at Lamarque like he’s crazy fucking insane.

This is the one with Agent Pontmercy, who looks at Cosette like she’s something to be held and loved and treasured, even after she runs off her mouth at one of her especially misogynistic platoon mates.

This is the one where Cosette becomes Captain America. Nothing more than a showgirl. She hates it. She’s not stupid, she knows what the men call her – the Star-Spangled Lass with an Ass – and it takes every single ounce of effort to not punch the Senator who calls her ‘sweetheart’ and explains to her in a patronising tone exactly why he can’t let her on the frontlines just yet. This is the one where Cosette sings after performances, not the propaganda songs that her chorus girls sing, but lilting melodies she remembers from home. This is the life where her back-up girls call her ‘Lark’.

This is the one where Eponine’s regiment is raided by the Nazis, leaving their base a desolate ghost town. This is the one where Cosette takes off to save her, Agent Pontmercy (“Marius,” he tells her, “My name is Marius.”) and Ebenezer Courfeyrac (“Don’t you fucking use my first name, I _hate_ my first name so _damn much_ –”), the CEO of Courfeyrac Industries who conveniently knows how to pilot a plane, in tow.

This is the one where Eponine falls off the train, Cosette’s name a cry for help on her lips.

This is the one where Marius’ voice is the last thing Cosette hears as she points Schmidt’s plane for the Arctic waters, thoughts of Marius and Eponine and a life that could have been playing in her mind.

 _You said you’d follow me anywhere, Ponine_ , she thinks, staring at the inky black of the sea outside the glass. _Well, it’s my turn now._

The one where Marius goes on to found S.H.I.E.L.D with grief brimming in his eyes. He settles down eventually, has a son called George with a wife who loves him the best she can, but he never forgets Cosette.

This is the one where they find Cosette’s plane seventy years later, frozen in the ice. The one where she fights Loki and the Chitauri invasion with the Avengers, the only other girl on the team besides Agent Musichetta and her deadly smile. The one where the men automatically defer to her leadership, even Courfeyrac Junior in his metal suit and Dr. Grantaire Sargent in his green Hulk form. (And damn if it doesn’t feel good.)

The is the one where she mourns the loss of Agent Combeferre and joins S.H.I.E.L.D and visits Marius in the nursing home (her heart breaks a little but she tries not to think about it) and goes running and befriends a soldier-turned-counsellor named Feuilly, who wears a pair of rings on a chain round his neck, and two sets of dog tags.

This is the one where she meets Ponine again. But Ponine doesn’t remember her.

“Your name is Eponine Thenardier,” she chokes out, on the Helicarrier. “And you’re my best friend.”

“You’re my mission,” Eponine hisses, pressing a knife to her throat, and what remains of her heart shatters, crumbles into dust. She is tired. She is so very tired.

“Then finish it,” Cosette hears herself say. She closes her eyes. “’Cause I’m with you to the end of the line.”

This is the life where Eponine pulls Cosette out of the Potomac, and cradles her unconscious body like her life depends on it without knowing _why_. This is the life where Eponine stays, learns to piece together her memories with Cosette by her side every step of the way. And if they learn that same-sex relationships aren’t illegal (mostly) anymore, well, who’s to say what follows after?

But this is the life that doesn’t happen.


End file.
